{"id":7367,"date":"2026-08-06T14:17:49","date_gmt":"2026-08-06T13:17:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thetab.com\/filmshrine\/?p=7367"},"modified":"2026-08-06T14:17:49","modified_gmt":"2026-08-06T13:17:49","slug":"the-shards-what-happened-to-matt-kellner-ending-fate-the-book-explained","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thetab.com\/filmshrine\/2026\/08\/06\/the-shards-what-happened-to-matt-kellner-ending-fate-the-book-explained\/","title":{"rendered":"What happened to Matt in The Shards? The book’s answer is somehow more horrifying"},"content":{"rendered":"

*Warning: Spoilers ahead for The Shards premiere and the novel by Bret Easton Ellis. Some may find this content distressing*<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Ryan Murphy\u2019s<\/a> TV adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis\u2019 autofictional novel The Shards has premiered, with the first two episodes culminating in a truly gruesome sequence involving Bret\u2019s (Igby Rigney) friend and secret lover, Matt Kellner (Owen Painter).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

As expected from an Ellis adaptation, there\u2019s plenty of drugs, sex and \u201880s aesthetics. The series, like the book, is a fictionalised retelling of the author and his friends\u2019<\/a> final year at the prestigious Buckley School in LA in 1981.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In this version of events, his life is upended when the mysterious new student Robert Mallory (Homer Gere) joins the school for his final year, and it just so happens to coincide with the rising violence of a serial killer known as the Trawler.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The killer has a very gruesome MO: they abduct, kill and mutilate household pets, incorporating their remains into horrifying displays alongside the human victims. In the days leading up to the attacks, victims receive a string of silent phone calls. And that\u2019s exactly what happens to poor Matt.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What happens to Matt at the end of The Shards episode two?<\/h2>\n
\"The
Credit: FX<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Following his disappearance, Bret receives a mysterious tape outside his house brandished with nothing but his name. We soon learn it\u2019s the audio of the Trawler torturing Matt. The show cuts between Bret listening to the audio and visuals of what happened to Matt.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We see the Trawler forcing him to eat his pet fish, which were stolen from his house days prior. The killer then gets a bottle of pure LSD, fills a syringe with it and injects it into his victim, who has already been badly beaten and is covered in bruises and cuts.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Immediately, Matt\u2019s out of it and starts mumbling, \u201cGod\u2026 light.\u201d The killer then demands, \u201cEat them,\u201d which is breaking point for Bret. Realising what he\u2019s listening to, he takes off the headphones and runs to the bathroom to vomit.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The episode ends there, meaning we don\u2019t know whether Matt is dead yet or not. Even though this is only episode two, the tap scene unfolds much later in the book, around two thirds of the way through.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Before we go any further, if you haven\u2019t read the book and don\u2019t want to know about Matt\u2019s fate (or you can\u2019t stomach gore), look away now\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

Matt’s horrifying fate in The Shards book explained<\/h2>\n
\"Matt
Credit: FX<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Similarly to the novel, Matt first begins experiencing the Trawler’s calling card: silent phone calls where someone simply breathes down the line, disappearing pets and other unsettling signs.<\/span><\/p>\n

He then disappears without anyone immediately realising anything is wrong. A few days later, his brutally mutilated body is discovered floating in the family\u2019s swimming pool.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The authorities quickly construct a sanitised version of events, publicly claiming Matt died accidentally after taking a large amount of drugs and falling into the pool.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bret later goes to see Matt\u2019s father, Ronald Kellner, who shows him gruesome images of the crime scene. \u201cThe first thing I saw was a body, carefully positioned, lying by the pool on a sheet, drowned, naked, the penis shrunken into nothingness,\u201d the passage reads.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Bret describes the many injuries all over Matt\u2019s body, including his left arm, which he describes as \u201cgashed open, the wound wide and pink, deep enough so you could see muscle and sinew.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

In the final photo – the only of Matt\u2019s face – he\u2019s said to have an almost peaceful look on his face, which Bret juxtaposes with the description of another gash where the \u201cskin had peeled off and you could clearly see the white bone of his scalp.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n